Page 36 of The Price of Protection

Rose’s throat swelled so much that she couldn’t speak at first.

“But I know you have a life. You have responsibilities,” Rhett offered. “So please, tell me if it doesn’t work for you. I’ll get out of here. Don’t worry.”

Silence swelled between them. Rose wondered if he really wanted that. Did he realize this was a mistake? Did he want to go?

“No! No. I want to catch up, too.” Because Rose realized that if she let Rhett slip through her fingers today, she’d never forgive herself. Even if they only caught up for half an hour at most, she needed to hear his voice. It transported her back to a simpler time.

“I’ll close early today,” Rose said. “I’ll be done around four. Pick me up?”

His eyes focused, and sure, Rhett said he would. Over the next three hours, as Rose waited for him to return, she worked herself into such anxiety that she thought she might have to cancel. Her stomach twisted, and no matter how much water she drank and how much she tried to meditate, she couldn’t calm down. Rhett Baldwin was coming to pick her up. She had half a mind to call her mother in Florida and tell her the news. She tried to imagine what her mother would say. Maybe something like, “You never should have broken up with him in the first place!” Maybe that was true. Rose also considered texting Maxine to say she’d be home late, then remembered Maxine was with Mike today, so there wouldn’t be a problem.

When at last four o’clock came, Rhett appeared. Rose was in the midst of locking up, her keys jangling. When she turned toward him, she felt a strange instinct to fall against him, to breathe in his warmth. “You came back,” she said.

“I said I would,” Rhett offered.

They stood there in the dying autumn light, looking at one another. Rose yearned to ask him if he’d had second thoughts, then stopped herself.

“Where should we go?” she asked instead.

They walked through downtown for a little while. Although each time she glanced at him she saw a man in his forties, Rose still felt as though they were teenagers, killing time. She asked him easy things, like when he’d gotten to Nantucket and where he’d been taking photographs before this, and he answered, illustrating a life that seemed adventurous and artistic and entirely him.

When rain began to spit from the sky, Rhett suggested they grab a glass of wine, and she followed him into a cozy wine bar. The dog, Reggie, lolled on the carpet in the middle of the room, just as he always did, and the owner, Stacy, came out to say hello.

“Rosie, you’re out of the bakery early,” Stacy said. She eyed Rhett curiously, although Rose knew she didn’t know who he was. Rhett had left long before Stacy had opened this bar.

“This is an old friend of mine,” Rose said. “Rhett Baldwin.”

“Pleasure,” Stacy said. “Are you in town long?”

“Not sure,” Rhett said.

“Rhett’s a travel photographer,” Rose explained. “He goes where the wind takes him.”

“This chilly wind is apt to take me elsewhere, too,” Stacy said, laughing. “Isn’t that right, Reggie?”

Reggie made a sound in his throat and rolled his eyes. The three of them laughed.

Rose and Rhett ordered two glasses of wine, and after Stacy brought them, she returned to the back, as though she knew they needed privacy. Rose guessed they reeked of “people with a past.”

“It’s hard to believe you’re here,” Rose said finally, furrowing her brow. “What brought you?”

“Nostalgia.” Rhett shrugged. “It’s my home, still, in a way. Every beach, every street, every tree seems to contain a memory.” He tapped his chest.

“It’s been strange to get older here,” Rose explained. “I have all those memories, too. But they’re stacked under newer memories. It’s like a kind of collage.”

“That’s beautiful,” Rhett said. “I heard through the rumor mill that you were married?”

“I was,” Rose said, laughing. “I heard you were, too.”

He joined her in laughter. “I guess we know more than we want to let on. But yes, I was married. It all fell apart a long time ago, but we only got around to making it official recently.”

“You knew it wasn’t right early on?” Rose asked.

“I think so,” Rhett said. “But what is life but telling yourself things are working till they really aren’t?”

“I know what you mean.” Rose’s eyes filled with tears, but she blinked them away.

For a little while, Rose told Rhett about the process of opening the bakery, how it had come as a result of her divorce and her desire to build something new for herself. “Something that had nothing to do with romance,” she said. “Something that could prove to my daughter what kind of woman I was. I knew it would be a lot of work. In the end, it was more work than I imagined! But it was worth it, mostly. And it’s certainly a well-oiled machine now.”